Egypt's constitutional affairs committee head stresses adherence to gov't decisions to survive COVID-19 pandemic

CAIRO – 10 April 2020: MP Bahaa El-Din Abu Shoka, head of the legislative and constitutional affairs committee in parliament, said on Friday that the Egyptian government is taking a set of significant decisions that all seeks to protect its citizens from the novel coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic.

"The Egyptian government is doing its best to protect its citizens from the COVID-19 pandemic,” Abu Shoka said. “Citizens, however, also have a responsibility of adhering to these decisions and instructions to save themselves and their country.”

He further added that the government decided to add an extra hour to the night curfew to ease crowdedness, stressing that all citizens must adhere to the curfew.

He also asserted that the government should not tolerate any violations of its protective measures and decisions and that punishment should be deterring.

Abu Shoka added that the government is exerting strenuous efforts to protect and preserve the safety of its citizens, therefore, citizens themselves must be responsible and adhere to the government’s decisions and orders to pass this crisis safely.

Earlier on Wednesday, the prime minister gave a speech to announce measures to curb the spread of coronavirus, including extending curfew and the flight ban in the northeastern African country until April 23rd.

Among the decisions intensifying sterilization procedures for all state facilities and deducting salaries of the prime minister and state ministers by 20 percent for three months to support precarious employment.

“Our projections for this week were 120-150 cases daily. There will be increases in the number of infections in the coming two or three weeks…but the more important thing is that the rise is slight and gradual,” Prime Minister Mostafa Madbouli noted.